


A Bookstore Named Anteiko

by QueenOfKites (orphan_account)



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball, Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: M/M, Multi, done a hundred times before, not very romance-y
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-29
Updated: 2015-05-29
Packaged: 2018-04-01 20:56:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4034305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/QueenOfKites
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A small bookstore plus cafe at the corner of the street, busy during the day, nearly unreachable at night. However, that doesn't mean that some interesting things don't occur there. At the wrong place, at the wrong time, Kagami Taiga rediscovers the world that he thought he'd be able to forget.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Bookstore Named Anteiko

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own Kuroko No Basuke or Tokyo Ghoul, or their characters!
> 
> I hope you enjoy this crossover fic! I will try my best to update as often as possible.

There was a thick mist hanging in the air, filled with smoke and dust and sharp hints of petroleum. The moon was just a bit smaller than the usual, and the night was an hour short of its peak. The office-goers had gone home, and the party goers had begun to leave their homes. A neutral time of night, wherein it was difficult to find anyone without a purpose on the streets. 

And yet, there was Kagami Taiga, dragging his suitcase behind him on the smooth pavements that weaved around Tokyo, unsure of what he was supposed to find. A loose aircraft tag dangled from the case’s handle, the thin strap worn from what had been a long flight. His legs were barely managing to pull over in front of each other, and the free hand played with the coins in his pocket. Penniless and homeless was not a good combination. 

The streets were bare, with nothing but the occasional police officer seen on duty, or a parked car or two. Most people were inside shady little restaurants, drinking, smoking away all their troubles. Kagami’s were far too great to vanish with such a pathetic attempt. 

Would they leave him alone, or follow him? The question repeated itself in his mind, mimicking different voices as it did. Tatsuya. Alex. Mom. Dad. Everyone’s voices echoed his head, starting to meld together into an incomprehensible mess, which he eventually decided to ignore for his own sanity.

At the end of what seemed like a path that went on for miles, a small establishment at the corner was dimming its lights, preparing for the night. A sign hung on one of the windows illuminated by a faint light, making the text on it more visible. The font was ghastly, but from he could squint to make out ‘Anteiko - Bookstore and Cafe’. 

No doubt that they would be closing anytime, so Kagami made sure that his feet worked faster than usual, hoping to catch the place as shelter, maybe receive a bit of help. The suitcase jumped over a few stones behind him and the tag came loose. The glass doors nearly shattered when his palms pressed against them, throwing him into the building ungracefully. 

A small groan was heard a few seconds before Kagami raised his head, his eyes meeting the bare tables and chairs organized in a rather random manner. The decorations on each set was simple yet refreshing, a single white flower, surviving on a meagre volume of water. Elegant. 

“I suppose you’re here for coffee.” A drawling voice that struggled to keep awake addressed him. 

A clerk, dressed up in what was supposed to be a buttoned shirt, but began to resemble a poorly maintained polo shirt stared at him through dark, lidded eyes, tousling up his short hair. “Hey, Tetsu, when was Shintaro supposed to come?”

Kagami’s eyebrows raised, unaware as to whom he was addressing.

A voice came from behind him, splitting the confused silence. 

“I’m sure he’s already started from the hospital, Aomine. As for now, we have a customer.”

A blue-haired boy, small in stature, with a composed, ready look on his face stood behind him, wiping a table with a translucent piece of cloth, looking rather occupied, as though he had been working for hours. 

“How long have you been there?” Kagami’s finger pointed to him, his voice shaky with incomprehension.  
“Well, I was here when you entered.” His manner of speaking was frank.  
“How come I didn’t see you? I swear, I saw the tables but not you-”

He was cut off by the other worker of the store, who let out an unnecessarily loud yawn. “Damn, I’m getting hungry, we were just about to close too.” 

“Well, Aomine, we’ll just have to wait. Midorima would not be delayed by petty things.”  
“Do we, Tetsu?” He was staring at Kagami almost indecently now.  
“No,” his voice was firm. “Please make a fresh batch of coffee for him.”

Another noise of protest erupted from him, before he stretched and began to move around with the grinder and some cups. The lighter haired worker folded his cloth, clutching it with purpose. “Please, take a seat. My name is Kuroko Tetsuya. Would you like anything with your coffee?”

Kagami’s eyebrows raised. Tetsuya. The name resembled Himuro’s so very much, an interesting coincidence.  
“I would like something to-”He gulped. He couldn’t ask for anything other than the coffee. “Never mind.”  
“Are you sure? Just the coffee?” The redhead nodded, approaching a table. 

With a dip of his head, Kuroko made his way to the counter, speaking to his coworker in hushed tones. The latter’s expressions were quite animated, but something about said expressions did not convey any appreciation of their topic. His voice was close to rising enough for Kagami to hear clearly, but the discussion died out before he could. 

Within several minutes of pointless staring at the spines of the books that filled the shelves, the coffee arrives, warm and inviting, in a large mug. He muttered some thanks to the server who went back to resume conversation with, Aomine, he called him. 

Kagami stared into his cup, the small swirling bubbles of foam soothing his anxiety. What he wouldn’t have given to have called Himuro and told him how completely screwed he was, and how furious that his parents didn’t arrange anything. Would Tatsuya even be awake? The time zones would ruin everything. 

Focus on the coffee, he told himself. He took a sip, letting calm him, comforting with just the hint of bitterness, just like what he’d get back home. The warmth spreading through his fingertips was the most wonderful thing he’d experienced in nearly twenty four hours.

“Is it alright?” He expected a smile on Kuroko’s face, but was met with a strange, determined look.  
“It’s great, it’s great!” He nodded to emphasize.  
The server dipped his head. “Thank you for the compliment; glad you think so.”  
Kagami nodded once again, and took another hasty sip. 

Aomine was slumped over the counter so far away, eyeing Kagami with more contempt than friendliness. What the hell was the guy’s problem? Servers should be polite most of the time, shouldn’t they? Obviously, they’d get more customers. Although, it wasn’t as though this time of night was peak hour. 

As the level of coffee in his cup came closer and closer to the bottom, Kagami was struck by the painful fact that after he’d leave this place, he’d have nowhere to stay. It struck him that he could ask for a overnight stay at the cafe, but the owners most likely lived somewhere else and would have to close up for the night. Still, Kagami could defend the shop in case of thieves at night. He licked his lips at the thought. 

He finished up the last droplets that were left at the bottom of the paper cup, and turned to the severs, to find the shorter one missing. This time, he blinked again and again, and he was still not visible, so it couldn’t have been a trick of the light. The staring from the other server had not stopped, and at this point, Kagami felt the need to point it out.

“Hey! Is there something on my face?” Aomine didn’t seem to hear.  
“Yo! I’m talking to you over there.” He raised his hands over his head and waved, but nothing worked.  
His gaze went from passive and eerie to terrifying, as though he wanted to keep Kagami in a fish tank.  
“Okay, really, what is wrong-”  
“Say, do you like eating?” He licked his lips. 

Oh, so he was just hungry. “Um, sure, but I already ate a while ago.” A blatant lie.  
“Good, so do I.” He loosened his shirt’s collar and stretched.  
“Where’s the other worker?” He asked, uneasy with how unassuming Aomine seemed.  
“Oh, he went upstairs to find some more coffee beans, we’re running out.” He shrugged. “It’ll take a while.”

A light beep interrupted whatever little conversation was happening, and Aomine flipped the phone with precision.  
“Yo, Shin, where the hell are you?” He groaned upon hearing the response.  
“Okay, fine, you don’t need to.” His eyes flicked to Kagami. “I have another arrangement.”  
He put the phone back on the table, and massaged his temples.

“What happened?” Kagami was, in his defence, trying to be as polite as possible.  
Aomine smirks. “Yeah, since when have you known me since middle school?”  
The redhead blinked. He was trying to be nice, what was this guy’s problem?  
“Either way, I think we need to get the evening over with.”

Kagami nodded, pulling out his wallet. “How much?” The smell of smoke filled the air.  
“What the-” The shock of the sight made him fall from his seat.

Aomine’s dark pupils had retracted to half their radius, turning from a blue black to to a glowing red that spreads in thin lines to the top of his cheek, the light part of his eye turning darker than the night. Something Kagami knew, but had never seen in an enemy. The smoke is visible, coming from his back, and the tongues of purplish blue fire emerge immediately. An ukaku. Meant for speed and long distance attacks. 

In a blur, the door leading to the cellar where Kuroko had gone was latched shut. 

Kagami raised his hands. “Sh-shit. Just chill out.”  
Aomine sighed, cracking his knuckles. “Look, dude, I’m hungry, you don’t even smell good, but I’ll have to make do.”  
“You-” he breathed. “You don’t understand! I’m-”  
“Stop talking and hold still, it’ll be easier.”

Kagami jumped to the side, but naturally, he wasn’t quick enough. The rip through his jacket barely reached his flesh under the layers, but it revealed his dry, tanned skin. “Shit, shit, shit!” Aomine’s head snapped over to him, and a low laugh escaped him. 

“You’re not bad,” he commented. 

His form leaped to Kagami, who reached for a table, knocking it over. His large body was not covered entirely by the thin, round table, but it gave him a bit of momentary comfort. Less than two hours spent in Japan, and the wrong side of the battle had turned against him. He had expected that there was no ghoul activity in Tokyo, and he’d have a break. 

At the best time, too, a time when his kagune was malfunctioning. 

Dad said that he’d had problems like that in his youth, and a very specific trigger was needed for his kagune to be used. Kagami would grow out of it. Three years have passed, and a dead ghoul’s kagune is more functional than his. He whispered curses under his breath, flexing his back as tightly as he could, trying to find the trigger.

Something sharp and red hot collided into his shoulder, sending searing pain throughout his arm. 

His hand clutched the area, grunting at the way it amplified at his touch.  
“Please stop fighting. I’m going to win anyway, so make it quick.”  
With a heavy swing, the table flew from behind him, crashing into the wall in a flurry of dust.  
“Jesus,” his back pressed against the window, his feet trying to inch away from the ghoul. 

“Okay, good!” Aomine grinned, and his kagune’s tongues danced a few inches from his prey’s face.  
They retracted a fair distance, ready to strike like spears, and the tense feeling in Kagami ended.  
Four rope like structures lunged for Aomine, and pushed him away to the counter, crashing against it.  
A few ceramic mugs and plastic cups fell off the counter.

“Aomine-kun!” A loud thudding came from the cellar door.  
“Tetsu, I’m in the middle of something!” He pawed off some blood at the corner of his mouth.  
All the competition in his mind amplified. “Oho, I haven’t fought a rinkaku in a while.”  
Shit, this guy would get into a lot of street fights. 

His kagune had actually worked. But, what was his trigger? Kagami still couldn’t figure it out. Either way, he had other problems. His kagune would not be fast enough for Aomine, but the redhead begged that the ukaku would be tired. It had been a long day at work, no doubt, and he was starving. Maybe that would have an impact on his speed. 

With his left arm nearly being severed off with a rough bite, he learned painfully that this was not the case. The bite ruptured his skin, a wound that would take several days to heal, as it bled through his shirt and his jacket. Of course, it would only heal if the rest of him survived. 

Kuroko’s voice sounded from the cellar again, the banging causing his words to be unheard.  
“Shut up, Tetsu!” There was a harshness to his next words. “It’s no use trying to get out!”  
The rinkaku ropes wrapped around his wrists and ankles while he was distracted.  
“What the-” He hissed. “Shit!” They slammed him down into the wooden floor, cracking it. 

A thin puddle of blood was left on the floor when he raised his head slowly, red stains around his nose and on his lips. His ‘wings’ sparked and flickered like lightning, and Kagami’s left side erupted into pain, his nerves giving in to the gash. His head was swirling with sleep deprivation, an empty feeling in his abdomen, and now, the fire racing up his arm. 

Aomine cleaned up his face with his hands, and pushed his short hair, watching Kagami writhe in pain and restlessness, a wonderful, wonderful feeling. “Well,” he announced. “It isn’t really a habit of mine to leave the victim moaning and crying, so, I’ll put you out of your misery.”

With a smirk, he stepped on one of the limp tentacles that had come from the peak of Kagami’s intensity. The agony shot through the line to his back, spreading itself across his muscles, and stretching all of them till their breaking point. 

“A sad downside to having the rinkaku,” remarked the victor, a cocky grin plastered on his face.  
With another stomp, he added, “Once it’s gone, it’s easy to ruin.”

The thick fluid that had made Kagami’s head heavy was numbing all his motions, and he couldn’t retract his kagune before Aomine battered it with his heavy shoes, eliciting a few groans of protest, but no action. 

The cellar door, which had been rattling for a while, burst open in a flurry of dust, that grabbed Aomine’s attention. Kuroko’s eyes widened considerably, but he showed no more emotion at the ruined restaurant, with a table broken against a wall, the counter and its glasses damaged, and two ghouls, one energized, and one nearly dead. His mouth hung open slightly. 

“How the hell-” Aomine’s sentence was cut off at the sight of the crowbar in the waiter’s hand.  
“You, I think-,” he huffed breathlessly, still absorbing the scene. “-will need to explain.”  
Kagami’s half closed eyes opened weakly to see concern, but not shock, in Kuroko’s eyes. 

The ropes that were closer to being flat than cylindrical, began to shrink into themselves, coiling up and decreasing in thickness, until they disappeared somewhere into the holes made in his jacket, and what was felt could be called relief. 

Kuroko’s hand was floating in front of his eyes, and instinctively, he reached for it, his weight nearly bringing the shorter one down. As his legs sprang into action, his laceration cried out again, and he clutched it. Kuroko eyed Aomine with mild annoyance, before gently picking up the torn flaps of his favourite trench coat.

“It’s quite awful,” he said, his face void of emotion. “I’ll fetch a first-aid kit.”  
Aomine looked like he had to state several things, but said none of it.  
Kuroko seemed to disappear back into the cellar, the door now wide open.  
Kagami’s entire form tensed, his eyes lingering on Aomine, untrustworthy. 

The latter’s momentarily confused expression melted into a look of indifference, one that suited his face rather naturally. He straightened his shirt, and rubbed the area under his nose to check for blood, upon finding none, he walked over to the counter, and nonchalantly picked up the broken glasses with his bare hands. 

“How many times have I told you not to do that?” A deep voice commented, before forming a gasp.  
Aomine groaned without lifting his head. “You’re early, Shin.”  
Without a word, the figure walked into the cafe, sticking out for more reasons than one.  
His bowl like hair was a bright green, like his wide eyes, guarded by old-fashioned spectacles.  
“What the hell happened here?” His gaze flitted for Aomine, to the ruined table, to Kagami. 

He blinked at the red stain all over his left, but did not seem flustered by it.  
With no concern for the redhead, he turned to the server that was cleaning.  
“Daiki, can you not keep your fights outdoors?” A few slender fingers straightened his glasses.  
Aomine clicked his tongue, leaving a few pieces to be. “I thought he was human, and you-”

“I am not part of this,” said the figure sternly. “I had several emergencies to attend to.”  
“How many? Were you the only nurse there?”  
He huffed and corrected, “Doctor. And no, I wasn’t. Have you heard of Hippocrates’ Oath?”  
“I would if I could pronounce his name.”

“A doctor who takes that oath cannot abandon a patient in need.”  
“Yeah, well, tell Hippocrates to get a life.”  
“Who the hell are you?” Kagami interrupted once he had the strength.

The man blinked, momentarily distracted. “Midorima Shintaro.”  
“Kagami Taiga,” he replied, his voice strained. Midorima dipped his head in acknowledgement.  
“Once Akashi finds out about this fight, I think he’ll want to speak to you both.”  
Aomine was snapped out of his apathy. “Shit, Shin, no. Don’t you dare.”

“I shall,” said he firmly. “It is my duty to inform him of everything that happens around Anteiko. This happened inside Anteiko.” Aomine growled, but said nothing. 

“Akashi?” asked Kagami faintly. Midorima nodded.  
“Ghouls in the vicinity are to be reported as a first priority. Where do you live?"  
“Um, well,” Kagami though about it. “I just arrived in Tokyo.”  
“You don’t have accommodation?”  
“Well, not really.”  
“You will stay at Anteiko. There are bunkers above the shop itself.”

“Isn’t that a decision for the previous residents to make?”  
Kagami jumped at hearing Kuroko’s voice behind him, and turned to see a white box in his arms.  
Midorima shrugged. “I’m sure Akashi would suggest the same.”  
Aomine gaped. “You can’t just do that.”

The doctor pushed his glasses up his nose. “I need to make a call.”


End file.
